Note

During this module I have really gave it my best shot to grasp every opportunity to present in order to really develop my presentational skills. I feel that through work shops and seminars and other events at university, I have been able to progress massively in terms of my confidence and my ability to talk to other about my work and practice. 

Note

This is an old post that should have been posted around 4 weeks ago.

Below is a picture of my PDP before I had chance to refine it more. This is basically just to show how my PDP developed over the module, I thought hard about which areas I wanted to work on and then developed the PDP sheet according to that.

Note: Peer Exhibition

I decided to utilise an opportunity that was presented to me around a week ago, myself and a group of my peers were approached by a budding art director who offered ourselves a free exhibition space. As part of this module, I decided to accept this offer and thought that it would be a great point to blog about in terms of going above and beyond my 5 personal development points. To get vital practice into exhibiting was not on my PDP however I thought that it would give me some professional practice for later in my photographic career. The exhibition space is an old large shop which has been derelict for a year or so, it is right in the middle of manchester in the Corn Exchange building. I have chosen to print a series of my latest work on metalworkers. This experience has made me really think about what work goes into exhibitions and it is great experience for the future!

Model Release Form (OLD POST)

This is a post from several weeks ago.

I also wanted to make a model release form as part of this module, not to address my PDP points but just to assist myself in the photographic world. Below is a screenshot from my model release form.

Contextualising My Work

One of my PDP points of interest was to really try to contextualise my work and practice at the moment, in order to be more confident in talking about my work to others as well as creating more passion and drive.

This is something that I am constantly trying to develop and this assignment gave me the opportunity to do so. Through certain work shops during this module I have been given time to try and think about what it is my work is about and what I am trying to achieve. I am now able to narrow down my area of photography to anyone who is wanting to know!

Through a presentation for my final major project where I had to present what my final idea is going to be, I had to practice my speech about the set of photographs I am currently working on and how I intend to develop this and explore this in the future.

I am very happy with how much I have been able to bring to light my own individual approach and how I can now speak about my practice. I can now sum up my work by saying the following... Due to having worked in the metalwork industry for over 5 years on and off, I learnt to really appreciate the work of talented engineers and craftsmen within this industry. Metalwork Engineering is a declining industry and a lot of the work that our country needs doing is being sent abroad or being shipped over being made by machines. I am interested in the praise of these talented men, giving recognition to their hard work and skills which have been passed down through many generations. I am currently in the process of visiting a number of different metalwork forges and blacksmiths to talk to and eventually photograph these workers. I have chosen to branch out from photographing initially in the one forge where I have worked for the last 5 years, I want to meet other engineers and speak to them about where they think the industry is going and where they can see their small businesses in the future. Below is an example of how I see the final images looking, this being a starting point. Through use of different equipment I will experiment until I find my own unique way of photographing these men.

Although it is hard to show my new found ability to speak more confidently about my own work, I now feel very confident attending a portfolio review or an event where I can speak to other practitioners within the industry.

I am very satisfied that I can now tick this item off my PDP list, I will however continue to keep developing my individual style in the future and will be able to thank this assignment for starting me on my way.

 I have continued to keep contextualising my work throughout this assignment and reading books such as Camera Lucida and Susan Sontag "On Photography" I have been able to put further contextual references to my own work, making me think about the reasoning behind certain choices.

My PDP 8/12/13

Below is a copy of my newest and most up to date PDP, complete with dates of when I intend to overcome each objective and wether I have already. This plan will stay on my computer for the near future and I will continue to keep up to date in terms of sticking to my plan and working on the chosen personal development points.

I really feel that this module has helped me to progress in terms of a photographer, I feel much more confident not only in terms of technical issues but also as a photographer and being able to talk about my work confidently and to others. 

Post Production Skills & Techniques

Due to one of my professional development points was to develop my editing skills, I decided to take some time and practice this after a photo shoot that I did at the beginning of december. I was asked to take some photographs of a friend of mine who models part time. He is signing to a new modelling agency and needs some portfolio shots for the company. We arranged to meet in the centre of manchester and we walked around and took some really nice photographs!! Below are examples of the photographs I took. 

Note, the below 3 images were all RAW files which I edited in Photoshop, I looked at the levels and other basic corrections then I delved further into certain editing tools such as layer masks, adding subtle colours to the images. I then used VSCO CAM to add effects onto the images, as requested by the client for a unique look. I have attached the edited images lower down in this post. 

I am really happy with the final images and the client is also very happy with the photographs. I decided that this would be a great opportunity to address one of my PDP points for university, it was also great exercise and practice for future post production. One thing that I took from the editing session is that subtle changes are often more beautiful than bold changes to an image, I am a great believer that most of the editing of an image can be done behind the camera when taking the photograph. Saying this, the edits done on the following images have came out very well.

I chose to use VSCO CAM, an up and coming editing software which I was told about through a tutor, its a way or adding filters and vintage affects to images but in a professional way. It is basically a professional quality instagram. 

Below are the VSCO edited images.

Another set of work that I decided to practice my post production skills on was the "praise of engineers" brief which I am currently working on for my final major project. I really tried to use all of the editing software to its full capability, making sure that I gave the editing process more time than I do usually. Below is a quick screenshot of just one of the areas that I looked at whilst editing, I looked into many more areas of photoshop than I have before and it has really made me more confident in terms of editing. I did not screenshot each of the editing steps that I have taken. 

Although the above screen shot is just documenting the hue/saturation section, I did go into more in depth methods of editing.